Kitesurfing was in its infancy when Rolf Joosten decided in 1998 that it would be a great sport with a massive potential for Kitesurfing Lessons in  Barbados conditions. Rolf moved to Barbados in 1996 after travelling several countries on the hunt for the perfect place to relocate to. He managed the 2 Club Mistral Windsurf centers on the island from 1996 to 2005 . One at Maxwell Beach and the other one in Silver Sands Beach. Barbados is a paradise for watersports of all kinds. The wind is predominately blowing between 15 and 20kts between the months of November and July which makes it a bit light for heavier windsurfers at times. Seeing this as an opportunity for kitesurfing, Rolf decided to contact the inventor of the original Wipika kite (Bruno Legaignoux), talking to him about the oportunity to open a Kitesurf school in Barbados. In May 1998 Rolf received a nice big orange Wipika 8.5 from Bruno and started learning on a converted 2.53m windsurf waveboard. For the purpose the straps where moved forward to be suitable for kitesurfing. Due to Rolf’s prior experience with stunt kites, paragliding, windsurfing and snowboarding the kitesurfing progress came quite quickly.  Steve, a good friend started practicing along with Rolf and soon got hooked to this new and exciting sport as well. Steve was driving the Backup car along the coastline of Barbados when Rolf did his first downwinder to Club Mistral in Maxwell one day. This long run was giving Rolf the practice to manage the first jibes and soon after he was able to kitesurf upwind with his 2-line Wipika 8.5.

In August of 1998 Rolf met Raphael Salles, the founder of F-ONE kites  in Marseille,  to buy one of the first series kiteboard from him, a F-ONE 215 surf-style directional board with 3 fins.

Things from here progressed quite quickly, Rolf introduced this new and exciting sport to the Head office of Club Mistral in early 1999 and the idea was born to open Kitesurf schools all over the world. Rolf did several seminars for Club Mistral in different locations and started teaching the sport to adventure seeking tourists and frustrated windsurfers in Barbados. In 1999, Rolf introduced Kitesurfing to the management team of the Mistral group, doing a presentation with a video of the early days showcasing the potential of Kitesurfing. The title of the presentation was: Kitesurfing – In Sport 2000.

We all know now that this prediction was correct and North Kiteboarding which is now the largest and most successful manufacturer of Kitesurf equipment was born in 2001.

Rolf became a certified IKO and VDWS Kite instructor in 2005 and looks back to many successful lessons and seminars.

Simon, Rolf’s son was born in 1996 and moved with his family to Barbados at 2 1/2 months old. Simon was always around kitesurfing and due to his dad’s passion he started playing with little stunt and training kites at the age of 4.

In early 2002, Rolf built a little harness to put Simon on his back. He took Simon out for his first Kitesurf session at the age of 5. Simon who was always up for excitement throughly enjoyed his first run through the waves of Silver Sands. (Luckily his mum wasn’t on the beach at the time….)

At the age of 10 Simon was finally starting to seriously enjoy kitesurfing as the equipment was getting more accessible for beginners and the sport lost most of its potential dangers which led to a rather fast progress of Simon’s kitesurfing skills. Simon soon spent more time kitesurfing than skateboarding which was his initial #1 sport. It also didn’t take too long to show his dad the next level of the sport. Today in 2017 Simon is an outstanding strapless kitesurfer with world class skills. Simon started teaching Kitesurfing in 2014 and passed his IKO instructors course in the same year. Due to his laid back nature and amazing kite skills, Simon is an outstanding instructor and is looking forward to pass on his skills and passion to you!

In 2016 Simon opened his own Kite School “Upwind Barbados” to step into his dad’s footsteps and to earn a living through his passion. At Upwind Barbados we strive to have the best, certified instructors paired with the best equipment on the market to introduce you into the world of Kitesurfing.

We teamed up with Fanatic Boarders Centre which supplies us with the world leading North Kiteboarding and ION equipment.